1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to an outdoor umbrella, and more particularly to an outdoor umbrella incorporated with an attachable lighting system which can provides illumination and is fully compatible with a folding and unfolding motion of the umbrella.
2. Description of Related Arts
Outdoor umbrella are commonly used in many places, such as beach areas, patio areas, campsites or domestic gardens etc, for shading sunlight in the daytime. A conventional outdoor umbrella usually comprises an umbrella base, a supporting stem upwardly extended therefrom, a foldable awning frame which comprises a plurality of awning supporting arms radically and outwardly extended from an upper end portion of the supporting stem, and an fabric-made awning securely and foldably mounted on the awning supporting arms. None of the conventional outdoor umbrella provides any lighting device to be mounted thereon. As a consequence, during nighttime, a user of the umbrella may either mount a lighting device, such as a portable lamp onto the supporting stem of the umbrella, or simply set up a ground lighting device on the ground in which the umbrella stands for illumination.
It is a challenging task for incorporating a lighting system with an outdoor umbrella because the outdoor umbrella needs to be folded and unfolded frequently. Therefore, the lighting devices have to be installed in such a manner that they are compatible with the folding and unfolding actions of the umbrella and that all such actions would not impart any potential damage to the lighting devices. Electrically, one has to ensure that all lighting devices are properly connected, and that the folding and unfolding movement would not cause any interruption of electricity supplied to the lighting devices. Someone may wind a series of small light bulbs connected by a cord, or some sorts of decorative lighting devices along the awning supporting arms of an outdoor umbrella in order to provide illumination. However, these typical lighting means are generally not suitable for outdoor umbrellas in the sense that they are not flexible enough to match with the folding and unfolding actions, or specifically the relative motion of the awning supporting arms of the outdoor umbrellas. In worse, during folding and unfolding, the movement of the awning supporting arms may destroy the small light bulbs or connecting cord hanged thereon, and this may further cause more serious disaster such as electric shock of the user.
As a matter of fact, because of the above-mentioned considerations, independent lighting devices can only be securely mounted on the awning supporting arms in the positions where they would not be hit by any other awning supporting arms.
Under certain circumstances, the user of the outdoor umbrella may want it to be partly opened or opened and supported inclinedly to shade the sunshine from a specific angle, for example the sunshine from the west during the afternoon. However, when the awning frame is opened and supported Inclinedly, any lighting device manually mounted thereon will be moved to an inclined angle too. As a result, the normal illumination effect of the lighting device is adversely affect, for example the illuminating direction may change from illuminating downwardly on the table and users located right below the awing to illuminating outwardly and sidewardly.
In addition, since an outdoor umbrella is by itself designed to be foldable for easy transportation and other reasons, the lighting device mounted thereon should fully compatible with the umbrella and, therefore, should be constructed in a detachable manner for easy storage and for easy carrying, especially when the umbrella is folded. Under certain circumstances, such as when the user does not want the lighting system to be mounted onto the umbrella for a certain period of time, the user may simply detach the lighting system from the umbrella to store separately.
A main object of the present invention is to provide an outdoor umbrella incorporated with a lighting system to provide illumination while it is fully compatible with the folding and unfolding motions of the umbrella.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an outdoor umbrella incorporated with a lighting system which is capable of self-adjusting the direction of illumination at a predetermined angle regardless the folding and unfolding motion of the umbrella and the inclined angle of the awning.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an outdoor umbrella incorporated with a lighting system which can be easily attached and detached anytime and anywhere by an user.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an outdoor umbrella that incorporates with a lighting system without significantly altering the original structure and appearance of the outdoor umbrella, so as to minimize the manufacturing cost of the present invention.
Thus, in order to achieve the above objects, the present invention provides an outdoor umbrella, comprising:
an umbrella awning;
an umbrella supporting frame which comprises a main supporting stem;
an awning frame which is supported by the main supporting stem and comprises a plurality of awning supporting arms outwardly extended from the umbrella supporting frame to support the awning to define a shading zone thereunder;
an attachable lighting system comprising at least an illuminating arrangement which comprises:
at least an illuminating unit for illumination;
an illuminating unit supporter which has an guiding surface formed on a bottom portion thereof and is securely connected to the awning frame; and
an illuminating unit adaptor which has a holding member securely connected to the illuminating unit and an engagement member having an engaging surface arranged to slidably engage with the guiding surface of the illuminating unit supporter, wherein the illuminating unit adaptor is detachably attached to the illuminating unit supporter in such a manner that the illuminating unit connected to the illuminating unit adaptor is capable of sliding to maintain a substantially vertical orientation when the awning frame is folding and unfolding or supported in an inclined position; and
a power supply device electrically connected to the illuminating unit and supported by the awning frame for transmitting an electricity to the illuminating unit.